You spend 6 to eight hours in a bubble canopied airplane at 45 to 55 thousand feet and tell me its not hot.

EDIT: Not to mention what it does to your ears when you roll in on a target.

Heat didnt bother me. I spent most of my duty day outdoors. In my world it never rained, it never snowed, it never got too hot, it never got too cold, and it never got dark, for 14 hours a day, 6 days a week. Weather.. meh, it is what it is, and you never thought much of it. The special treatment, was what was annoying, and on top of that, they would STILL complain if everything wasn't just perfect for them. Thankfully, i didnt spend all of my enlistment in an engineering unit attached to an air wing so i didnt have to put up with that grabage all the time.

The difference BTWN enlisting and earning a commission.
But as John Kerry said...............

I'm still trying to figure out where you come up with this idea. I looked for evidence to the contrary, and came up short. It turns out it is far 'more' a replacement. My only thoughts are - we already have a squadron of F-117's... Anyway, from my notes:

Stealth RCS:

According to the Russian engineers that pulled the downed F-117 apart, they estimate RCS to be about .01 - the exact same RCS as found on F-22, so neither has an advantage there. I can tell you the mixture of materials as used on F-22 is a hell of a lot easier to maintain that the RAM coatings as found on F-117, and it is not vulnerable to water or moisture in the air.

Speed:

F-117 is Subsonic only. F-22 has Supercruise of at least Mach 1.5 (The minimum for the design requirement, and considering an F-22 in military power can out accelerate an F-15C in full afterburner means it is probably much higher) giving it the capability to be on target and out of enemy airspace twice as fast, as well as giving the enemy half as long to react considering they know it is there.

Range:

F-22 - 1800 to 2000 mi with internal fuel (non-supercruise), and 2800 mi with drop tanks. F-117 range is at 535 mi.

Internal only weapon payload:

F-117 - 2 LGB's. F-22 - 2 JDAM's along with 2 AIM-120C's and 2 AIM-9X's and GAU-4 Vulcan 20 mm cannon giving it the ability to go Air to Air even inroute to target and giving it the ability to give aid to other NATO aircraft at any time without jepordizing itself - a capability the F-117 doesn't have at all.

In the air to air mode, 1 single F-22 took on 6 F-15's at the same time alone, and after several sorties, the F-15 pilots gave up even trying to fight since it became more of a game to simply survive for longer than 2 minutes than to even bother about fighting it. They all died (vuirtually only) over and over again.

Avionics:

I won't even get into this, but the F-22's ability to share information with AWACS and other surrounding NATO aircraft and the ability to use its active aperture, electronically-scanned array (worth its weight in gold by the way - litterally - it is that expensive!) with little chance of counter detection is something the F-117 is completely lacking. THe one thing the F-117 has going for it is some sort of secret LGB designator that is supposed to be very accurate as compared to other fighters/bombers.

I tired of typing. Basically, the F-117 doesn't really have anything on F-22 that I can find which is why I questioned that statement. If you want more, I can keep going.

-S

Ouch! You make it sound really bad! :-? Sorry to hear that.

F-117 is vulnerable to Long Wavelength Radar and F-22 is not? THis is another thing I just pulled. Maybe that helps explain F-117's retirement:

...high maintenance costs and older stealth technology that is vulnerable to long-wavelength radar, combined with a subsonic speed limit, makes the F-117 more dangerous to fly. They contend that the F-22A is the logical successor considering that:

• Its stealth is nearly as advanced as the B-2's, and reportedly more effective than the F-117's.
• It can fly at supersonic speeds without using afterburners and thus can reach targets more quickly.
• Its radar-absorbing material requires far less maintenance than that of the F-117.
• The new 250 lb small diameter bomb entering service and designed specifically to fit in the F-22A's internal munitions bays have the same penetrating power as the larger 2000 lb BLU-109 bomb.

Their are commissionied officers in the engineers too. You never saw them being the baby's like the flyboys. While we had our share of flakes, most lead by example.

Accidently posted this in the wrong thread:

From Wikipedia:

Does this explain why they are retiring?

-S
One F-117 has been lost in combat, to Serbian/Yugoslav forces. On March 27, 1999, during the Kosovo War, the 3rd Battalion of the 250th Missile Brigade under the command of Colonel Zoltán Dani, equipped with the Isayev S-125 'Neva-M' (NATO designation SA-3 'Goa'), downed F-117A serial number 82-806 with a Neva-M missile. According to Wesley Clark and other NATO generals, Yugoslav air defenses found that they could detect F-117s with their "obsolete" Soviet radars operating on long wavelengths. This, combined with the loss of stealth when the jets got wet or opened their bomb bays, made them visible on radar screens. The pilot survived and was later rescued by NATO forces. However, the wreckage of the F-117 was not promptly bombed, and the Serbs are believed to have invited Russian personnel to inspect the remains, inevitably compromising the US stealth technology.[9]
The SAMs were most likely guided manually with the help of thermal imagers and laser rangefinders included in the Pechora-M variant of the SA-3s believed to have been used. It is unlikely that the radar could have gotten a solid track on the F-117 for more than a very short time, which would have not be enough to launch and guide an SA-3 to the target. Reportedly several SA-3s were launched, one of which must have exploded close enough to the F-117A to force the pilot to eject. According to an interview, Zoltán Dani was able to keep most of his missile sites intact and had a number of spotters spread out looking for F-117s and other aircraft. Zoltán and his missile crews guessed the flight paths of earlier F-117As from occasional visual and radar spottings and judging from this information and what target had just been bombed, Zoltan and his missile battery determined the probable flight path of F-117A #82-806. His missile crews and spotters were then able to locate it and fire their missiles. Zoltán also claims to have modified his radars to better detect the F-117A, but he has not disclosed what was changed. Parts of the shot-down aircraft are now presented to the public in the Museum of Yugoslav Aviation in Belgrade.
Some sources claim a second F-117A was also damaged during a raid in the Kosovo War, and although it made it back to its base, it never flew again.

You pretty much just summed up the reason behind this nation's most expensive defense project ever: the pilot community wants to keep their job.

PD

sorry to burst your guy(es?) bubbles, but the F-22 is NOT going to replace the F-117. The F-35 JSF (joint strike fighter) will. F-22 will replace F-15 and F-16. F-35 will replace the F-117, F/A-18, and the AV-8B Harrier.:know: